Thursday, March 29, 2007

Hooked on Tigers

Tiger Beach (Bahamas)Photo: Wolfgang LeanderClick on image to enlarge

I free-dived 52 years ago for the first time in my life in southern France, and to this day I can still fully relive the overwhelming sensation of being able to enter into another world, Cousteau's silent blue world, and weightlessly swim in it....

Free-diving with tiger sharks for the first time in my life, only two weeks ago in the Bahamas, left me as breathless as back then, in 1955...

To swim with tigers spoiled me completely - all other sharks I have seen and swam with, even large ones, pale in comparison.

No other sharks have a stronger expression of character than tiger sharks: The square head, the blunt front, the comparatively large mouth, often tightly shut - and those inquisitive, intelligently looking black eyes...

I have not dived with sharks more gentle than the tigers of the undersea world.

I feel reborn as I am hooked on tiger sharks, never to be released again from the spell of an animal that is almost as old as God himself...

Disclaimer

Please be aware of the fact that diving with sharks can be potentially dangerous. Do NOT closely interact with sharks, touch them, feed them unless you are very experienced and know exactly how to interpret their body language. While it might look easy and harmless to interact with sharks the way we do, we do NOT encourage this type of underwater activity.